Deb and Sara at the World Trade Center

I was at the top 2 weeks before 9-11.

Hey gals! There's a low flying plane in the background. What's up with that?

That's what someone wrote in the comments, R2.

I think it was too early in the morning for visitors (when the planes hit), so probably no one was up at the observatory.

But what is freaky to think about, is how horrible it must have been for the people who jumped out of the burning building from the high floors.

I was on a trip to NYC, and my traveling companion and I wandered down that way on a Sunday afternoon. This was in the Spring of 2001.

I looked waaay up at the tall buildings of the Trade Center towers and thought "shit, those are tall buildings." (I know, rube.) I wish now that I'd gone inside. Assuming the lobby was open on Sundays, which I'm not sure about.

I worked there for a few weeks as a temp in the late 90's, on the 101st floor in the offices of a steamship company. I have a terrible fear of heights and it was horrifying looking out of the windows, and feeling the building sway/creak when it was windy.. I was also scared shitless during every elevator ride, with all kinds of scenarios running through my head: getting stuck between floors, cables snapping, the lights going out, that there was just a thin floor between me and a 101 story drop.

Out of desperation, I almost took a job at the department store nearby. I walked through the lobby and felt impending doom. Glad I didn’t take the job!

I had cocktails at Windows on the World once. I remember it had the scariest elevators I've ever been in, and I'm not usually scared of elevators. You could feel it banging against the sides of the shaft as you were pulled up and let down.

I visited there in the ‘90s, not that I have any memories of it. I had to be reminded by the person with whom I went that I had been there.

I went there in summer 2000 - I’m very scared of heights but my then boyfriend wasn’t. We ate something at Windows on the World and went to the section where you could kind of sit on the floor with your legs dangling over a recessed window (if that makes sense if anybody remembers). Boyfriend LOVED it! I couldn’t even approach the windows. Even now my legs tingle at the thought.

Top? Datalounge? Does not compute

We used to go there all the time in high school on our days we went into the city. The observation deck creeped me out, that catwalk on top of the building you walked around. I went up there once, then after that always stayed on the inside observation deck.

I had lunch at Windows on the World.

I went as a ten with my family and a few times With friends in the 90s; I’m Very afraid of heights but was fine at the windows because you couldn’t actually fall And the roof deck was even less scary because you were raised up bit arid 10 feet from the edge. Back then the RCA building was much scarier because there was just a stone wall that in some places was rather low - they have high glass panels there now.

I ate at Windows on the World too. Food was meh, but the view made it all worthwhile.

I watched the towers go up from the neighborhood in Queens where I grew up. I still expect to see them on the skyline when I go home to visit my elderly mother.

1980 and then in November 2001 when a lot of the aftermath was still around.

My dad took me there when I was 13. It was just us on this trip. (Nifty intro). The elevators were scary. I remember being on the viewing deck and trying to figure out how to get past the mote.

I was there three times. Once for an event that was on a low floor, and twice I had to go to an office on a high floor. Like R7, I was scared of those elevator rides. I don’t remember what towers I had visited, but I remember feeling very uncomfortable during all three visits.

[quote]I went as a ten

Oh come on, honey -- even on your best day you're barely a six.

Weird how they sometimes show 90's and 80's movie with the WTC towers there if they happen to show the NUC skyline.

thanks for running with my typo R18 - an edit function would make this place less fun. As a teen I was indeed a 6 but I late bloomed into a solid 8.

I wonder what Deb, Sara and Mark are up to these days.

[quote]Even now my legs tingle at the thought.

Holy shit R9, I thought I was the only one who got that sensation at the thought of heights. I even got it a few times just reading the other comments here. Mine is like a light electrical current/muscle contraction in my calves and runs down to the arch of my feet. I wonder if this phenomenon has a name...

There’s something about OP’s photo that is so poignant. It touched me and not sure why. Look like two Midwestern gals experiencing NYC for the first time. Just before the workd turned upside down.

Is it true that all the jews knew to stay home on 9/11? My racist grandfather told me that years ago. He told me Israel was behind the attack.

Not true.

[quote] Look like two Midwestern gals experiencing NYC for the first time. Just before the workd turned upside down.

That's exactly what I thought about the video too.

It just seemed like simpler times.

Vertigo, R22.

R24, you should have reminded your racist grandfather that Cantor Fitzgerald occupied the 101st through 105th of the North Tower, and lost 658 employees — 68.5% of their entire company — on 9/11.

[quote]Cantor Fitzgerald... was reported to have a higher percentage of Jewish employees than would be expected from a statistical analysis of the population - even the New York City population.

But the racists will find racism one way or another:

[quote]The lives of many Jews [who worked at the WTC generally and specifically Cantor Fitzgerald] were spared because they went to synagogue to pray on the morning of Sept. 11. Because of the proximity to Rosh Hashana the next week and the Selichot prayers, the service that day was particularly lengthy... on a day when 20 minutes meant the difference between life and death.

Howard Lutnick (CEO) survived because it was his son's first day of kindergarten and he walked him to school. Upon arriving, a school administrator informed him his office was looking for him because a plane had hit the building.

Morgan Stanley 10 years before the attack.

I loved the architecture and the materials of those buildings. The plaza space was not welcoming. The World Financial Center fixed that for inclement weather. I also worked at the NYSE. I liked old downtown and new downtown.

In those days, nobody was downtown after hours. Windows on the World had gone out of fashion quickly. Downtown was day-time place. Nobody lived there - though a few lived in Tribeca.

I have vertigo but was OK with the swaying and OK in skyscrapers. I can't deal with unprotected drop offs.

The lobbies and shiny steel were beautifully done. But there are so many gems downtown.

I was just looking at Vanderbilt one, the ENORMOUS tower built next to Grand Central. I think there will be many soaring lobbies somewhat referencing WTC.

I like the Empire State building. Classy. Didn't get knocked down. A real winner of a building.

I've read many stories by people who said the WTC was ominous and unsettling for years before the attacks. Those of you who visited, do you agree? Or is it simply people coloring their memories based on the tragedy that happened later?

Well it was enormous so impressive but it was not "ominous". It was a functioning gigantic business center. It didn't have bad vibes, in my experience.

One Chase Manhattan plaza was a bit chicer and human scale.

I went there as a kid in the 90s. I only remember that it was higher and that chips and soda were really expensive!

My dad used to work in the north tower on one of the higher floors. I remember visiting him and he’d show me how the building swayed in high winds and pens would roll off his desk. I remember seeing helicopter and planes flying far below us. I remember the roof deck and being annoyed that it was set back so you couldn’t spit off it like you could at the ESB. We went to Windows restaurant and I just remember being mesmerized by the view and how high we were - I was too young to think about “what could happen” scenarios. I remember the lobby, and the flags, I remember the globe outside the plaza. It truly breaks my heart that those two buildings are not there now.

I dont know if it felt ominous but as a kid in the 90s I hated riding the elevators there and also at the Empire State Building. The elevators seemed rickety and dirty. I always felt sick to my stomach riding in them

R30 - regarding the lobby light fixtures in your picture, I distantly remember that when we went up to the observation deck in the 80's they had some kind of dark netting over them, obviously an afterthought after some of the crystals likely fell. They replaced the netting with those lucite boxes in the 90's.

There was a cruisy men's room underneath the towers in the Concourse. J/O central.